inside excellent life
Some of the John Wooden‘s best sentences to remember when we lose our confidence.
“Ability may get you to the top, but it takes character to keep you there.”
“Don’t let yesterday take up too much of today.”
“A coach is someone who can give correction without causing resentment.”
“It’s the little details that are vital. Little things make big things happen.”
“The importance of repetition until automaticity cannot be overstated. Repetition is the key to learning.”
Crucial skill for the coaches of elite athletes is not only to have a technical background updated continuously, but especially the ability to manage the best athletes. They are coach – leader acting as a leader to conduct them to achieve their best performances. They are not coach – teacher as they should be with those less experienced. These coaches talk and make themselves in the shoes of the other to establish emotional closeness. This is necessary because the top athletes have built through their careers a specific profile summarized as follows:
Of course we must not fall into the trap of believing that a good level of effectiveness in these areas will be achieved with ease or that these individuals do not live moments of difficulty. On the contrary, these skills and standards are achieved and maintained through a continuous work, an effort to improve even when it seems far away, pursued even in those days that are frustrating.
One of the factors that limit the diffusion of the mental coaching among athletes lies in the resistance that coaches show toward this activity. For many of them the psychological preparation is “something more” to use only in those cases in which athletes show obvious mental limitations that hinder their performances. Coaches usually send to the sport psychologist those athletes that they call “athletes good for training” and that they have poor performances in the race. In other words, they send those athletes on which after having “tried everything” cannot “unlock”. Athletes who start a program of mental improvement from a negative state hope to achieve positive results in a short time, which is very difficult for athletes who often have the same problem for years, have never done anything to change and live every race with the hope that will be the one that will overcome their problem. In addition, these athletes are not used to invest economically on them, except for a few sessions of physiotherapy for physical problems, and then think about having a mental coach for at least a year with which to carry out a specific program becomes an additional obstacle. In favor of the athletes must be said that in Italy the sports federations and sports organizations of the State do not offer any support and, to be more clear, this sport side it’s completely misunderstood. Consequently, what are the athletes who attend programs of psychological preparation? They are usually the strongest athletes, those can win a medal in the international competitions, they understand the added value of mental work and are willing to invest financially. They are also the parents of those who practice sports such as tennis, golf and shooting in the planning of future career also consider this aspect and these athletes are generally motivated to follow these programs. To reduce the economic impact on the individual, sports clubs could arrange meetings with their athletes, but nobody else does. On the other hand it is extremely rare for a coach to follow a program of psychological training, so while on the one hand we tend to ever more extreme knowledge for physical and technical training, with regard to psychological ones we are still left at the principle of the stick and the carrot that everyone interprets according to his/her personal experiences.
In an unbelievable review The Daily Beast talks about the greatest stars who had failed in the role of coaches and manager. Among them myths like Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson: http://www.thedailybeast.com/galleries/2013/06/14/from-great-to-blah-star-athletes-who-failed-as-bosses.html#815027b6-2b8e-4092-9a13-dc2dcb24cde5
The marathon is a sport event that brings people together, spectators and athletes, in the desire to spend a day of joy. For many running the marathon is the realization of a dream, it’s the expression of their vitality, a journey full of personal meanings. This day for Boston is also the celebration of the Patriot’s Day, the beginning of the independence war of the American colonies by the British Empire. Moreover this year the last kilometers of the race had been dedicated to children and teachers involved in the massacre of Newtown, the city where a man, few months ago, made a killing in the elementary school. Whoever did this wanted to break this dream and make us feel helpless.
The story of Federica Pellegrini shows that even one of the most talented and successful athlete, needs at some point in her career a period of recovery after years of very intense work. She has not taken a year off but she has reduced the competitive commitments, the training hours and she is dedicated to a different swimming specialty. The example of Federica Pellegrini is true for everyone, not just for the athletes to the Olympic level. It teaches us that recovery is part of the sport career that you can not put stress on for years without having a recovery period. You can not always push hard, because in the long run this attitude leads to drop out and loss of serenity. You have to desire to train and to sacrifice yourself and to feel joy in being tired, when it becomes a burden you have to stop or reduce the commitment. This is also important for amateur athletes, who must not win anything but too often they consume themselves without ever taking a moment’s rest. We must never forget that the recovery is part of the workout.
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CEI Consulting helps athletes to:
CEI Consulting uses The Athlete’s Mental Edge, an exclusive performance enhancement system used by Olympic and championship-level athletes worldwide. It is a distillation of 30 years of research made in USA and Canada, Europe and Australia and hands on consulting with many of the world’s greatest athletes.
CEI Consulting is an assessment and coaching program including:
